Green Anarchy: Anti-Civilization Journal of Theory and Action was born in 2000, as an illegitimate bastard child of the primitivist-oriented periodical Green Anarchist from the UK. One of its offshoot editors splintered and moved to Eugene, Oregon where he became affiliated with the Earth First! Journal. In an attempt to publish direct action updates and articles from a more anarchist perspective, he started a newsprint zine called Green Anarchy. Although it was disjointed, somewhat incoherent, aesthetically impoverished, and grossly unedited, as a 16-page newsprint tabloid it was the inglorious birth of our project. After issue #4, the founder, who was moving away to pursue other interests in wilderness survival and such, passed on the project to the seeds of what became the notorious Green Anarchy Collective. After a couple of issues, the original editor returned to find his Green Anarchy-lite transformed into a collectively-run, hard-hitting, nail-biting, unapologetically anti-civilization project, which was too much for his luke-warm 19th century (and green-tinted) politics to handle, and he left for good. Needless to say, the fuse was lit and we were on a hyper-enthusiastic trajectory, as it seemed at the time that anything was possible....remember, this was not all that long after Seattle was trashed and Eugene was still the hot bed of vibrant, creative, critical, and militant anarchist activity....and we ran with it hard! Each issue increased in size, print-run, distribution, coherence, and relevance, and by issue #8, Green Anarchy was receiving national attention with articles like Ted Kaczynski’s “Hit Where It Hurts”, which received mention from the likes of Fox News. By issue #11 we had hit our stride, and by issue #15 we decided to change to a magazine format, in order to increase distribution by getting it into more bookstores and to preserve the physical longevity of the hard copies. Over the next few years, while our format continued to solidify, we broadened and deepened our discourse. The collective grew, shrank, evolved, split, and spliced, as change was essential to keep it fresh and alive, with a few key members (those of us whose drive and dedication verged on obsession) making it through most of the journey. Eventually, we had a 100-page journal circulating 8,000 copies an issue around the world. But, like all things, it came to an end.

plus-circle Add Review

comment

Reviews